Disclaimer: I neither own Naruto, nor am I making any profit.
A/N: Well, this chapter took me longer than I expected.
Deidara entered his apartment, closed the door behind him, leaned on it and took a deep breath.
He was so confused.
This was a discovery that could – no, would – change his life.
For good or bad, though? When he was done reading the kinjutsu scroll, all he could think about was how this could be what he needed to finally, finally, as the scroll itself said – give life. Give life to his creations, and achieve that next level of greatness he didn't know even existed a few hours ago.
These past years, he would frequently think about his life, about what would become of him. He had a wish, a path he wanted to follow, but never knew where to start. He loved his art, but couldn't find a way to project it out of his mind and into reality. So he trained and fought and survived day after day reassuring himself that someday, soon, he would actively start his career as an artist, and that this routine imposed upon him was just temporary.
But time passed, days and weeks and years, and he suddenly saw himself incapable of advance, unmoving, and all evidence pointed to his living the rest of his life serving this village, and dying frustrated and disappointed, no more important than some random person whose existence made no difference for the world.
That couldn't happen.
He'd always been bitter, even if just a little, for being a ninja in this village. He'd had no choice – as soon as his bloodline limit was found, his fate was sealed. His attempts to explain that he didn't want to fight and where's mum and dad were laughed at and he was quickly sent, four years old, to the Explosion Corps, where he got treatment for his burns and was introduced to taijutsu and ninjutsu training. Now he could remember that was the first time he was called Deidara.
And every time he spent his entire day studying ways to defend himself or destroy someone, every time he almost got killed in a mission or trained so hard he would come home just to fall on his bed and sleep amongst torn clothes and drying blood, he begrudged the fact that the time he could be using to perfect his art was being spent away in the endless work that was defending the village and making it richer, and that any day he could die insignificant and forgotten, like those he disdained so much.
Yet now, in one of these rare moments he had to reflect seriously about his past and his destiny, he knew the truth. If he was to be an artist, he had to be a shinobi. There was no way to be the first and not the latter. What could he achieve as a civilian? His talent with sculptures would be the same, but would also stop there. It was obvious that molding was only one part of the creation, and there needed to be more. For all he knew, he could have been killed, anyways. Being a civilian wasn't secure when you lived in a hidden ninja village.
He also dreaded the thought of being weak. After seeing murders – and, in some cases, killing people himself – he knew that, in this world, those who truly valued their lives had to be strong.
A civilian would've never found this scroll, either.
So he could accept that things were the way they had to be. Even the explosive chakra he blamed as the distraction that ruined his artistic inspiration was, in the end, the means for it – for if he was an ordinary shinobi and found that scroll, he would have to live tormented forever, knowing that his dream was out of reach.
That is, if the kinjutsu did, in fact, work as he thought it should.
And this was the center of his conflict. He did trust his abilities as a fighter and a strategist… but not enough to believe he could steal the precious scroll without facing any consequences. It was below the freaking Tsuchikage's office, damn it. This village was full of powerful and very loyal fighters, and had no tolerance for traitors. A shudder ran through his spine when he thought of the fate of these few who tried to defy their Tsuchikage and his council.
If he were to steal the scroll, he had to be prepared to flee. This was not his first plan; he used to think he could become an artist and stay here. As long as he could develop his art, he didn't mind fighting for the village. This place was familiar, the local of his birth, and he was a Rock ninja. Could he risk this security, this place that was his identity?
Images of his comrades and teammates passed through his head. While not all of them were pleasant, they would fight alongside him, and, in some rare cases – well, maybe just in Kurotsuchi's case – they would risk their lives for him. And he sure didn't want the kid to die.
Could he leave everything behind, and be all by himself? Kami knew loneliness wouldn't be his only problem; the village would hunt him all the way to hell. They were as relentless with their missing nin as Kirigakure.
Maybe he should just forget about it, and stay here. He would keep the hard work and become one of strongest Rock nin. He knew he had the potential.
But with this thought came the certainty that he would never become an artist. If he wanted to reach such heights, he had to take risks, even those of life or death.
Could he abandon his comrades and the only way of life he knew in the name of art?
His eyes widened and his mouth contorted in a snarl. What kind of question was that?
Of course he would.
The need for bonds of friendship and camaraderie and the fear of the different were what made people insignificant, what made it impossible for them to reach their full potential and forced them to be puppets of the system. Furthermore, if he didn't act fast, someone would soon discover the kinjutsu and report its location to the Tsuchikage, like the well-conditioned, good little slaves they were.
Furious at himself for even contemplating the possibility of putting his art in second place for anything, he cleared his minds of any doubts and started to think.
That night was a sleepless one. Fortunately, a night without rest meant little for a seasoned ninja like him. And the excitement – and even a little fear – pumped him and wouldn't allow him to become tired.
It was early morning and the sky was still dark. Deidara walked in front of the Kage's office, discreetly glanced at it and kept walking west, as if the building wasn't the center of his agglomerated thoughts.
He wouldn't charge straight and detonate the guard's heads out of their shoulders, take the scroll and run like hell, no matter how tempting such a course of action was. He already knew the risk of getting caught was great, but if he ended dead, it would be because his awesome, well thought of plan was a failure, and not because he acted like an idiot.
He kept walking slowly. No one would read anything in his behavior; sometimes he would wake up at random times at night, in those rare moments when he wasn't exhausted from work, and take a stroll while the civilians were asleep, hoping for inspiration to strike.
The library was twenty meters underground, but there were long, twisted stairs one had to walk in order to reach it, tight passages that wouldn't allow someone to wield a big weapon or do any movements that required lots of space. It was quite claustrophobic for someone like him, who liked being outside in the open and hated restraints. And since it was underground, there were no windows – not even doors that lead somewhere else. The only way to get out was through the entrance.
Unless he blasted his way through the ground.
No! Stealth, stealth. He had to do it as inconspicuously as possible. Those horrible missions that involved a quiet job in the shadows had to be useful for something, and today he would apply what he learned.
He could bomb everything and everyone at his heart's content if he got caught, after all.
There were guards who worked in rotations. Usually only one in the entrance of the library, who had quick means to contact the other guards in the office – there would be three to four, he knew, since he once worked to protect the place, too. Normally he would just take the person down silently, but he knew there was a jutsu in place that would ring an alarm to any ninja in a hundred meter radius if any of the guards got unconscious. Nasty.
And then he paused at his destination – a building in a nicer part of the village. Nothing rich, but surely better than the place he lived on.
He should stop trying to complete his missions all by himself, people said. No man was an island, they said. Funny how he would only listen to his people's advice in order to betray them.
Knocking or even entering wouldn't do – unlike his own apartment, this one was mostly inhabited by ninja. So instead, he made the four hand seals that were combined in his group, in order to alert each other when they were needed. Only this time, it was aimed at only one person.
It was very quick. They were well trained, after all, and worked together for years. Very silently, his teammate slipped through the door and outside, already dressed in his ninja gear, his eyes more alert than one would expect so early.
"What is it?", Issamu asked, wiping his brown hair away from his face and adjusting his headband, so the wavy strands wouldn't bother him.
Deidara opened his mouth, and closed it, an uncharacteristic, unexpected hesitation taking over him. This was his friend – his annoying, stuck up, bossy but very loyal friend. And today, his career and life could end, if this plan continued in motion.
Issamu looked at his blond teammate. The boy was looking preoccupied and conflicted. How out of character for him.
But Deidara had used the communication technique that was reserved for emergencies, and it was still night, so he knew he had be alert.
"What is it?", he asked again, when Deidara looked hesitant, and that made Issamu tense, and mess with his short hair again. He almost snorted. He was acquiring his comrade's bad habits.
Deidara finally set his face into a stern and grave one, obviously gaining control over whatever emotions were running free in that head of his.
"Cast that jutsu that won't let us be overheard, huh. We've got a mission."
Issamu's eyes widened, and he cast a simple technique: an illusion of the two of them the way they were now, only they were in the civilian clothes they wore when they weren't in active duty, and their movements and expressions looked relaxed and carefree. For anyone who looked outside the five meter radius, it would look like they were just having a friendly conversation.
"Remember the spy who caused us so much trouble weeks ago?" Issamu was going to say that of course he did, but the blond kept talking in a rushed tone. "There is more than one. I don't know how much, but they're good, and they've already invaded the village and have substituted some of our sentinels as we speak."
"What?" Issamu looked at his bewildered friend. "That's impossible. We would know if any of our men were substituted like that. We…"
"They're good at what they do, I'm telling you! I have just been warned by Gari, and I know he's the real thing. No one can fake our bloodline limit, so at least we can trust the Corps. Now listen. They are here because they want a scroll that is below the Tsuchikage's office. We have to get it and protect it. It has our village's most important techniques. But we have no time, so let's go now!"
The brown haired boy allowed himself to calm down and fall into the cool and collected mind state he always did when in an important mission where he had to rationalize.
"There must be a mistake in your judgment. While spies are a true danger in this village, the idea that they would be capable of taking the place of numerous fighters without raising suspicions is ludicrous."
"But they did. We have been the targets of very powerful people for too long. They had time to plan. Let's go! I need you there."
"For what?"
"We can't distinguish friend from foe right now, so we'll have to target everyone there, and you know there's only one way to incapacitate the guards without raising the alarm. A technique I'm most incapable to perform."
With a frown, he turned around, while concentrating on not letting the illusion fall. "I know. But I just don't feel capable of fooling one of our village's security measures and the village's ninja with it. Listen-"
"No, no, you don't get it, do you? It's not like we can alert anyone. What if they were one of the invaders? They would call the others and everything would go to hell."
"Where is the Tsuchikage?"
"We can't reach him right now, huh! Let's go, or soon they will have the scroll, all because you were too slow!" Deidara was now talking too loudly, and it was a pain to keep it inside the barrier. He looked frustrated and angry. And, if Issamu were to be honest, so did he. But he wouldn't lose control.
And his busy mind was finding everything just too farfetched, too implausible. He never thought the village invulnerable like the youngest academy students did, but the thought that outsiders could suddenly enter the village, take lots of their people out – their most talented, since only the best would be guarding the Kage tower and the village's artifacts and scrolls - , substitute them while discarding the bodies who knows where and then silently take away their treasured knowledge was just too much for him to accept.
Dark eyes narrowed in suspicion. "This is nothing I've been through before. And where's Kurotsuchi? Shouldn't she be here, too?"
"Only the two of us are necessary for this, and it must be done quickly, damn it! It is our duty as the village's ninja, and in the situation we're in you know as well as I do there's no way to contact someone else without taking a risk. I already took one by coming here to see you."
Issamu's breath was accelerated, and he felt torn. Something – gut instincts, those anxious feelings that usually saved him from death - told him he shouldn't do this, at least not as the blond wanted him to. What if he was wrong, and they ended making the situation worse? What if he didn't know what he was talking about? What if…
"We are teammates", Deidara said, in a serious and sad voice that sounded very strange coming out of his lips. "You should trust me now."
Silence.
That made him focus. Trust.
And at that moment when he had to make a decision, and so quickly, he had an epiphany.
Perhaps his teammates weren't the source of their last failure, and the imperfect completion of missions. He had always put the blame on them, and saw himself as the group's main pillar, the one who would hold them all together and clean up his partners' mess.
But what if he was the weak link, after all? Rock was stern and strict, but a good teamwork was composed of faith, of being one with his comrades when in action. Even those who detested each other would cool down and fight together in order to survive and have success. Yet even after he learned to appreciate Deidara and Kurotsuchi for their abilities, he still saw them as nuisances when they wouldn't act as he wanted, as if his words only were the way to success.
Now he was being tested by the fates, and had to believe and follow, instead of forcing others to do things his way.
He looked up at his partner, his friend, and nodded, determined. He would change, and he would trust.
"Lead the way."
The two walked towards the Kage Office, Deidara ahead. "Two in front of the entrance, as you can see. More two on the end of the stairs", he said, with the knowledge he acquired on his first visit to the place. "The two inside are a bit harder to spot, but you can see through genjutsu as well as you can cast it, plus they're not specialists with illusions and just learned those because they were ordered to."
Issamu nodded at his side. The two were crouched right behind a corner, and covered by another of the brown haired boy's techniques, that made it look like there was nothing there but a dirty wall.
The plan was for his partner to cast his strongest genjutsu on every guard in the tower. There was an alarm that would flare if any of the guards fell unconscious or thought something was out of place, so the only way to get in was to trap them in an illusion that would make them believe there was nothing in front of them but a peaceful, silent night, even when the two boys walked right in front of them.
Deidara wondered how he had managed to convince his teammate of doing such thing. Requesting Issamu's help had been an impulse. On one side, he knew he would never be able to get the scroll without his help, but on the other, he never thought Issamu would believe in what he said. He thought everything was a lost cause when the boy started rationalizing why the situation was improbable, yet at the mention of something as abstract as friendship, Issamu let himself be guided by the blond.
Weird. He never thought Issamu would be the kind to go for sentimental pressure. Kurotsuchi would be the only one to break under it in the group, he thought. Oh, well. Better make good use of this one and only chance.
Issamu closed his eyes and made the hand seals, clearly concentrating so hard he wouldn't be able to think or react about anything else, and trusting the blond to guard his back. Deidara was worried. This was no easy feat to accomplish for a chunin, and if Issamu made a mistake, the two of them would be screwed.
Yet a few seconds after, he felt the release of a significant amount of chakra from the brunet boy's body, indicating the technique was in effect. The two guards, visible in front of the doors, stayed immobile, without a flinch, as they should. They wouldn't be seeing anything but the calm, deserted streets at night.
The two jumped down and made their way to the entrance. It was a tense moment, to just pass right in front of the very awake sentinels and through the door they were guarding, but they kept still and had attentive eyes at the illusion forged in front of their eyes. Deidara had to admire his teammate's abilities.
Running silently through the set of stairs he had memorized with Issamu in tow, he slowed when nearing a corner he knew the other two sentinels would be at, at made the combined signals to the boy at his back. Issamu closed his eyes and made the known signals once more. Deidara couldn't refrain from swallowing nervously. Issamu was already holding two people captive in his illusion; Capturing another two without losing grasp on the first ones would be very hard.
The new release of energy revealed the guards that were hidden by their own genjutsu. Issamu's technique didn't look like it bothered the now visible guards at all, showing that things were going as they should. Relieved, Deidara turned back to Issamu to tell him to wait, but what he saw made the worry come back. The boy had his head down, his hands frozen in the last hand seal, and looked tired and strained. He quickly opened his dark eyes and looked at the blond pointedly, trying to tell him to hurry up, before once more putting his head down.
There was no time to waste. Running fast but silently, he went past the two guards who looked past him, entranced by the image of a still, vacant corridor, intent on going down another set of stairs. The door was near, and he would soon be out of here.
He abruptly stopped when he felt something was wrong. His instincts screamed that in front of him was a dangerous path, and while every extra second he spent here put him closer to death, he knew better than to doubt the feelings he got from experience. Concentrating on feeling the chakra around him, he detected the pattern of an earth release jutsu.
A rumble and the stairs he came from were blocked by a sturdy wall that grew out of the floor. At the same time, he felt the ground move below him, and the walls, the floor and the roof started to slowly close in. It wasn't a trap he hadn't seen before, but the guards were in the closed space with him, and as soon as the shifting walls made their bodies move, they would startle out of the genjutsu and find him. Alarmed, he made two hand seals and called forth his normal chakra, hoping to stop the claustrophobic closing.
It was harder than he thought. While his affinity to earth was strong, there was no specific jutsu he knew of that could cancel the trap without waking up the sentinels, so he had to pour raw, imprecise energy around him and try to tell it what to do. It was very draining, and after fearing he would be worn out and then crushed with the two ninja besides him, the disturbing noise and movement stopped, and the roof went up, the floor was back down and the walls slowly shifted back to their places, leaving everything, inclusive the guards, as if nothing had happened.
Deidara cursed inwardly, feeling that more than half of his chakra reserves were wasted away. Were this another place, and if he didn't have to keep discreet while stealing the scroll, he would have simply blasted a hole and found his way out, or used a more effective, chakra conserving but very noisy jutsu that would force the room back to place.
Hoping dearly there would not be a second trap like that one – if there were, he would be forced to use his explosive chakra, that was almost at its maximum and was more powerful, but would seal his fate, for anyone would be able to tell it was him – he went down more steps, entered the library and quickly lit one of the lamps, trying to control his unease. He went directly to the familiar scroll which was thankfully on the same place and position he left it at. The great relief took away a weight from his shoulders. If someone had noticed and taken away the scroll, all this effort would be for naught. Issamu's unknown sacrifice would, too.
Forcing down the annoying emotion he could admit was remorse, he extended his hand carefully.
And, thanks to this carefulness, the blond was able to avoid the worst of a burst of lethal water that came out of the scroll. With wide eyes, he watched the trap that was put inside his prize. It obviously wasn't there before. Did someone discover about him?
The water materialized in what were bigger versions of piranhas with oversized teeth. Who in the village would know such a technique? Deidara wanted to flee, but knew that, as the jutsu's target, he would just get followed and attract attention. He needed to get rid of them now.
The creatures attacked and were too fast for him to properly avoid. Teeth that were far too hard and pointy for creatures made of water injured his skin, and one particularly nasty bite almost took his right hand off. Swearing, he knew he had no other choice but to attack back with the earth element, no matter how much damage that would do to his halved reserves.
"Earth Release: Earth Corridor!"
The ground molded and moved according to his wishes, creating a prison with no spaces to escape through and crushing the trap's jutsu. The shock of different chakra natures nullified both techniques, and earth and water fell down, lifeless, into a big puddle of thick mud.
The remaining creatures that escaped the prison were too weakly charged to attack by themselves, and fell struggling to the floor, before dissolving into still, harmless water.
Ripping off his long sleeve, he used it to cover the gash at his pulse, trying to make the fabric stay as firm as possible, so his blood would stop falling down.
And then, all of a sudden, Deidara didn't feel as sure of his plan as before. He had known there was a possibility that things could go wrong, but actually living through the possible failure and capture was another thing altogether. There was no way the village's ninja wouldn't be alert by now, and already coming this way.
Taking the real scroll – he opened it very carefully to verify and put it in one of his trousers' pockets – He looked down at his blood, sprawled over the now damp, irregular, messy floor. Not knowing of a better way of cleaning it up – it wouldn't do to leave such obvious evidence of his guilt, no matter how dead he already was since the stupid water jutsu caught him – Deidara summoned even more of his regular chakra, forcing the damaged part of the floor to open and turn itself inside out, swallowing his blood and the remaining water.
Once more he cursed, now desperate. His chakra level was so low he would probably be able to perform only one more technique before getting dangerously close to complete exhaustion, so much he had drained of it. It was only his explosive chakra, mostly unused and demanding attention, that kept him alert and going. In a few hours – maybe even a few minutes – he could be facing torture and public execution. And to think he thought so little of it before when everything was alright, as if he could pay such a price in order to have this scroll. Right now, his resolution didn't feel as clever as it once did.
But now, there was no choice but to flee. Running away from the room, any care for stealth gone, he found the two guards still immobile. That was surprising. He thought Issamu would have left by now, or at least wouldn't be able to hold them for so long.
Running up the stairs, he found the brunet holding firm, but looking sick. His limbs trembled, and it looked like it was a huge effort to keep his hands and fingers closed in the right seal, let alone stay up. His breath was harsh and his eyes were closed tight, but as Deidara neared his teammate, the boy opened his eyes, with a startled expression.
"D-Deidara…" he wheezed, as if asking for permission to release the jutsu and get out of there. Without telling him anything, the blond kept running to the exit. As soon as he started on the spiraling stairs, he heard the boy behind him let out a pained gasp, and the almost imperceptible chakra in the air disappeared abruptly, letting him know the four guards under genjutsu would be free.
Now truly running for his life, the steps felt like they would never end. Was this a trick? Was he already caught under some Rock ninja's genjutsu, and they were playing with him before throwing him to the torturers? As a blessing and a great mercy, he saw the moonlight coming from the entrance. His legs were burning and he was exhausted, but he ran towards the natural light and the fresh air, wanting to get out of the place that felt much more constricting than it did when he entered it.
Stopping at the last moment, he hid back behind the last corner that would take to the underground's front door. His breath accelerated, he knew he hadn't been hiding well at all, but he knew that the two guards out there would be awake, and they would be either waiting for him, or they would enter and search. There was no way they'd suddenly disappear.
As if listening to his thoughts, it looked like they grew impatient and decided to enter. They were capable ninja and wouldn't be loud, but the very faint noises that Deidara could barely hear sounded worse than an uproar to his panicky mind.
A chuckle left him. This wasn't exactly the emotion he wanted to live, but it was still a break from the routine he'd been through lately. If he could use his explosive chakra… for every time he lamented his low reserves of energy, his bloodline would practically scream at him to be freed. Perhaps, if he had nothing to lose, he would use it. His dilemma would end – he would stop being the prey and become the predator, turn to where his pursuers were coming from and blast them to the other life, then destroy this whole thing and anyone who stayed on his way.
Ah… if only.
But he had something precious to him now, the scroll that his senses were acutely aware of, with the instructions that could lift him up to a new level of artistry.
And this thought fueled him. He was hurt, but still well. His body was in a great condition, if one forgot about his hurt hand, and that was nothing to someone like him. His normal chakra could be at its end, but his bloodline limit, his dear, beloved technique was ready to maim and destroy at his whim. He really didn't want to use it for there was still a very, very small chance he could escape from there without being discovered, and leaving any traces of his explosion techniques would ruin him. Still, if things turned too bad, he knew he wouldn't go down without a great fight.
And as he ran down, while thinking about a new plan – he had to get back up, and not down, after all – he found a very tired looking boy climbing the stairs in desperate but slow and inconsistent motions.
Issamu looked up at him with his brow furrowed and confused eyes, as if he still didn't understand what was happening. And he uses to call Kurotsuchi and I fools. But as these thoughts crossed his mind, he felt, once more, the horrible feeling of guilt, making him feel all knotted up on the inside. It was worse because he wasn't used to it, so it hurt so much more.
But the art was stronger.
It would always be.
And so, he turned his back to Issamu and stared at the stairs and at the guards who were going to come from in a few seconds. Tying his hair up in a tight bun, he took out the fabric he had prepared and quickly covered his hair and face with the made up mask, leaving only his eyes visible.
Here he was, planning to fight against jonin level shinobi without using his bloodline limit. It was ridiculous, but he could only hope.
As the two ninja appeared, they seemed to hesitate when they saw Deidara's attire, that was the standard Rock uniform, but his covered face was enough to make him guilty in their eyes. As they prepared to fight, the blond tried to recognize who they were and if they fought together before, so he could have an idea of what techniques they would use.
But as their faces became visible – the light there was low – Deidara recognized them as young teenagers who were just made chunin. They were older than him, but not remarkably strong in any way, and he was confused. Was this the security the Tsuchikage provided for the village's important documents? He could clearly remember the guards here were of a much higher level. Something was very wrong.
But they were still blocking his way out. Hoping these boys of mediocre abilities wouldn't recognize him, he attacked the one who came closer and was halfway in performing an earth technique – a simple one, but Deidara was in no condition to raise a shield to protect himself. Breaking the boy's seals sequence and avoiding the consequent physical attacks, he drew back his fist, and had to consciously hold his explosive chakra down. Hitting his enemy with all the force he could muster, he heard a crack in the boys' head, but also felt pain from his now damaged left hand. Using taijutsu without the aid of his explosions was hard.
Still, he was faster and stronger than this teenager who was taller but never had to go through the physical training routine of the Corps. A few more attacks the older boy couldn't avoid made sure he fell unconscious.
The young man left looked hesitant. It was understandable. Less than two months ago, this guy was just a genin, and was obviously late in getting his promotion. He let his partner fight by himself and now was left alone with Deidara who was practically half his size, but obviously more capable. It was no wonder he looked doubtful about advancing.
Knowing his time was short, Deidara ran towards him and made the first strike. He though just charging ahead would be enough with this guy, and was surprised when he dodged quite well and they circled each other, changing positions, Deidara now closer to the entrance and the other Rock nin deeper inside the corridor. His frustrated look showed he realized his mistake, but Deidara knew he had to get rid of him before fleeing. Thinking about the best way of doing so, he saw his opponent was holding up a bloodied kunai. Startled, he looked down and saw a gash in his leg, that was starting to bleed.
Yet again, he paid the price of underestimating his opponent. He left himself too open, thinking a guy who had barely made it to chunin wouldn't be able to hit him, and now had to deal with yet another bloody wound.
Needing to take this guy out of the game but knowing there was no way to fight for long without leaving quite a trail of blood, Deidara decided to use a medical technique to end the troublesome battle. He always had good chakra control, and this one required only a quick pulse. If he did it right, the young man would fall unconscious for longer than one usually would after receiving a strike to the back of the neck.
Engaging once again in physical combat, a few seconds were all he needed before he found an opening and tried, for the first time, to perform the technique he read only once about. Surely it was simple, and that would be enough?
The pulse was calculated and did exactly what Deidara ordered it to, yet the young guard's loud scream, that was interrupted by a sudden and strong hemorrhage from his ears, mouth, nose and eyes, followed by his body collapsing on the floor with violent seizures, reminded Deidara that he was no medic nin.
But it took care of the boy, and that's what mattered.
He made his way to the entrance faster than he thought he could. Once outside, the blond quickly turned back to look at the door, and started two earth element hand seals, no matter how much his already weakened chakra reserves protested. If he could do this right, there would be a chance.
Just as he was almost finished, Issamu appeared through the corner. How he managed to get there so fast in such a state he didn't know. It must have been out of desperation. The energy that fueled the boy must have left him though, as he fell to his hands and knees a few meters before the door that would lead outside. He still managed to look up at Deidara, his dark, disturbed eyes looking up at him through messy hair bangs, and there finally was some comprehension in his gaze, as if he realized he had been betrayed. Hurried steps and the sound of weapons hitting the narrow corridor could be heard behind him from the dark passage. The guards from inside must have reached them. Still, Issamu looked at him with something akin to a pleading, as if there was some chance the blond would stop whatever he was doing and retrieve him.
"Earth Release: Earth-Style Wall!"
With a unreadable expression, the same the brown haired boy used to wear when immersed in thought, Deidara spent the last of his chakra and the jutsu sealed the entrance shut, giving the blond only a few seconds to watch the guards caught up with his teammate and grab him roughly, hitting his head on the ground with a sickening crunch, and then silence.
And as he ran through the streets he knew so well, sometimes in the open, and sometimes through hidden passageways – the morning sun rays were starting to appear, and he could be seen, after all – he wondered what he should do, now. No one had seen him, and until now, he hadn't found a single ninja in his way. If he did, he would have to use his explosion release, for his normal chakra would now take days to recover, and then that would be the end of his chance of not being discovered as the perpetrator. Realizing that having his face covered on dark cloth would emphasize his crime, he freed himself of it and tied it around his leg wound. His battered appearance and the torn sleeve would give him away to other ninja, but civilians would think nothing of it. Beaten fighters limping around the village were nothing new.
He made the known way back home, wondering about how strange it was that things were going so well – he was alive and that was already too good considering the circumstances.
Deidara closed the door behind him quietly and locked it.
And fell face first on the floor.
Alarmed, he tried to get up, but a strong wave of dizziness kept him bent down. Holding himself still, he waited until the room stopped spinning – at least a little – and got up on weak legs, breathing quickly through his mouth.
Now that the adrenaline was gone and he was back to a familiar and safe place – or maybe not so safe, but being at his apartment did give him a small sense of security inside – there was nothing else to drive him and keep him alert and awake. He had never drained his chakra like this before – only the explosive one, since he almost always used his bloodline limit to fight. It looked like the complaints by normal people about how terrible it was to feel completely drained had some base. He made the right decision not to leave the village, then. In such a state, he would just faint near the gates. All of this, for the scroll.
He picked it from his pocket. It was still there – he had been very aware of it during his little "mission" – but he still wanted to have assurance that he was successful. Opening it, he found the same introduction he had practically memorized from the first time he saw it and, below it, he would find all the knowledge he wanted. Maybe now…
The exhaustion caught up with the blond and everything went black.
Kurotsuchi shifted her body's weight from one foot to the other and took a deep breath to calm herself. It wouldn't do to show such nervousness in front of other people. Her grandfather, particularly, would criticize her for it.
Still, similar to yesterday, she was worried and impatiently waited for some enlightenment for the situation she was in – only now it was worse, for she didn't know what happened to her two teammates.
After waking up early and dressing up, she went to the ninja academy. In front of it there were some benches, shadowed by short trees. It was the usual spot they would meet at when they didn't have to report to the Tsuchikage before doing the day's work.
After waiting for an hour, she knew something was very wrong.
To be honest, she started getting preoccupied after they were five minutes late. Punctual Issamu would never be late without a reason. But she kept waiting – maybe Deidara would come soon.
When she realized no one was coming, she went to the Kage Office. Her impulse was to search for her friends in their respective homes, but surely they wouldn't be lazing around when they all had an assignment, and she couldn't waste time searching for them. Maybe her grandfather would know what happened, since he knew about Deidara's whereabouts yesterday.
She came to find the office interdicted, with some high ranking shinobi around it, some analyzing the place, some hurriedly running from a place to the other. They wouldn't let her pass, but she could gather from the conversation that someone had invaded the office this night.
So there she stayed, waiting for another hour, until she saw the Tsuchikage coming out.
Knowing she wasn't wanted there but too anxious about Deidara's and Issamu's wellbeing to care about being improper, she ran up to him, avoiding the local guard who tried to stop her.
"Grandfa – Tsuchikage-sama!" she said as soon as she was on his hearing range. He turned to her with a frown.
"Kurotsuchi? What are you doing here?"
"My teammates… I can't find them anywhere!"
"I don't have the time for that now. Go search for them yourself."
"But – they are nowhere to be found!" She didn't mention the fact that she hadn't actually searched for them around the village. "This breaking in the office… were they involved in the conflict?"
"The investigations are being done. We will know everything about what happened soon", a villager from the intelligence office said, looking down at her through his spectacles as if she was an annoying bug. "Now, if you will excuse us…"
She looked at her grandfather with a dejected air. His expression relaxed a little, probably because of her obviously distraught emotional state.
"Deidara is well, Kurotsuchi", he said, surprising her, and then added in a low voice, "and that other boy… you don't need to worry about him."
Somehow, even knowing that her grandfather knew something about her friends' state didn't make her feel much better. Kurotsuchi didn't miss the fact that the Tsuchikage didn't mention anything about Issamu's wellbeing. No need to worry about him? How so? And didn't he tell her to search for them before she pressed for information? As if sensing the barrage of questions at the tip of her tongue, the powerful old man sent her a forbidding glare, and she knew he lost his patience with her, and let him go back to work.
She then shrieked and pulled at her hair furiously, deciding to go searching for the boys. When she found these two, she would somehow put them under a tracking jutsu as to know where and how the two were at all times, whether they liked it or not.
Sitting with his hair unbound and his legs crossed on his bed with the scroll wide open in his lap, the boy read slowly and with attention what he had only taken a quick glance at before. The scroll was very technical and he would have to research the meaning behind a term or two, but he could understand most of it.
It was night and, from the looks of it, he had slept the whole day. His normal chakra was barely restoring but at least he felt mentally and physically better after such a long rest. Munching in another apple, he handled the paper carefully.
The focus of the scroll was in infusing objects with chakra, as he had gathered before, but it sounded much more complicated now that he had time to look at it.
First was the theory: the village was preoccupied with the ninja who had the explosion release, because setting explosions so near one's self was very dangerous, and they were losing precious fighters. He had to agree – few had abundant control over the chakra, and many in the Explosion Corps were scarred by the results of the kekkei genkai's violent damage. Some even ended up crippled or dead. Deidara was very lucky for not having any scars but those he got when Issamu kicked him in what felt like such a long time ago and he lost control of the landmine fist, and they were already fading.
With such a danger in mind, the researchers looked for a way to set the explosions far away from the user, by allowing them to leave explosive traps and set them from far away, as one would with explosive tags.
As the scroll dwelled on the numerous experiments and the successes and failures, he decided to skip the section that was more history than anything practical.
Once the user has adapted his chakra to this new mobility, he will be capable of infusing the object in question with his chakra simply by having physical contact with it. Take as an example the rock that was used on experiment G-5. When calling up the chakra as one would when wishing to create an explosion with their hands, they now have the option of just inserting the energy inside the object, instead of destroying it. The user will become aware of the chakra in the rock, and can leave it hidden anywhere, or even fling it at an opponent. G-5 volunteer Haruo Imaizumi reports that he could sense the rock's location as if it were a part of himself and, by using the ram hand seal, the rock would explode with a strength as great as it would be if he had set the explosion directly from his hands. Other tests were performed to confirm this. Be noted the usefulness of this jutsu not only to securely use the bloodline limit, but also as a means to track an opponent that unknowingly carries the infused object. There is, however, a distance limit between user and object before the chakra on the latter dissipates.
While it was not exactly what he was looking for, that was still damn useful. He wanted to see his enemies' expressions when he shot them a kunai and then had it explode at their faces.
Not that he could do it if he didn't want his stealing of the scroll to be discovered. Oh, bother.
Deidara kept reading, knowing there was much more.
The second option is much more innovative and will require advanced control and other requirement(s) that we weren't as of yet been able to identify, for only part of the test volunteers were able to come with favorable results. By inserting the object inside the user's body, he becomes able to perform an advanced infusion that increases the power and resourcefulness of the technique.
Insert it on his body? The hell, would he have to eat it or what?
This new infusion takes a considerably longer time and the user must have greater chakra reserves and stamina. When finished, he will be able to control remotely the movements of said object, like giving life to unmoving things. That is why it is recommended to use an object that is capable of being moved around, similar to a doll or something that resembles an animal, insect or alive creature – or anything with legs capable of carrying the whole weight around. Volunteer Kazuko Aoki reported having a greater perception about the 30 cm wooden puppet while it was infused with her chakra, and, in an extraordinary discovery, of also being able to feel and understand, if in a limited way, its surroundings. The explosion destroyed a 14,76m range, three times more than she would have usually achieved with the same amount of chakra if the explosion had been let out directly out of her body. Next volunteer –
Deidara yelped. So immersed he was in the reading, he kept eating the apple until it was finished and then he proceeded to bite the fingers holding it.
Cursing at his idiocy, but still incapable of holding back the gleeful smile on his face, he went back to where he stopped.
Next volunteers were incapable of sensing the object's surroundings like Aoki, and were capable of creating explosions of varied ranges, the greatest one of a 55m range that destroyed the objects in the area and drained the user of his chakra. Experiment K-2 has every result detailed.
The scroll was indeed extensive, but he made himself read everything, even the smallest speculations, before jumping to action.
The instructions required a Fūinjutsu circle and an extensive amount of hand seals. Deidara practiced the sequence numerous times, careful not to actually use any chakra while doing so, until he had it all memorized. Quickly moving the furniture to a corner, he took a brush and some paint – part of the standard ninja set, even though he hardly used it until now – and started drawing on the floor, noticing how his small apartment could barely contain it. When done, he checked it numerous times.
To be honest, he was quite afraid of doing some irreparable damage to his body or chakra, and wondered what would be sealed by the Fūinjutsu. But it wasn't like he could go to the village's specialists for help, and the scroll listed numerous experiments that were done until they managed to elaborate the right way to perform the kinjutsu.
Steeling himself, he closed the scroll and put it inside a box in the bathroom, so it wouldn't be damaged if something went wrong with the jutsu. Placing himself inside the circle in the correct position – sitting over his bent legs, positioning his hands between his legs in the first seal, the snake, and bending his back while looking down – looking like a devoted prayer, and considering how he was wishing so hard that this would work, the position was appropriate – he took a deep breath and started the sequence.
Forty two seals, but he had a good memory. There was no need to hurry, so he made them in a moderate but sure pace. The ink lines were activated and shining and he could feel the chakra from his bloodline limit fueling them. After finishing the first half, he could feel his pathways tingling, and became very aware of the room as his energy coated it. For a moment, he worried about the prudency – or lack of it – of doing such an attention calling ritual in his apartment. Shoving those concerns to the back of his mind, for now it was too late to have any regrets, he finished the last seals, and grew worried as his chakra poured, more and more, outside his body and in the circle. Was it not enough? Would it suck him dry? He had an impression that the failure of such a massive ritual would have worse consequences than simple chakra exhaustion.
Gasping in fear as the last of what he had left his body and he felt terribly empty, he had just two seconds to start regretting the whole procedure before it all came back to his core violently fast, shocking him out of his position and sending him to the floor, convulsing in seizures and an exquisite and strong feeling that was almost like pain, but not quite.
Deidara lay there for what felt like a short time, but he knew was longer from the clock that had fallen to the floor and accused that almost three hours had passed. Getting up weakly, he looked around himself. Everything was very silent, and the lights had turned off. He tried to turn them on, but the light bulb wouldn't light up. Lighting a candle, he could see the circle and the symbols were still there, but the paint was fading and the whole composition was powerless.
Had it worked? Something had to have happened, for the procedure was surely quite the spectacle. He looked down at his hands. The blond didn't feel different in any way. Both his normal chakra and the explosion release one felt normal, his bloodline limit's energy just a little bit spent.
With a mixture of excitement and worry, he went to the bathroom and picked up the scroll. As it was too dark inside, he lighted half the candles he could find in the drawer and scattered them around the room. With all of those candles and the circle, his room looked quite macabre, as if he was trying to summon a demon, and he couldn't avoid thinking about what Kurotsuchi's reaction would be if she decided to visit him right now. Snorting at the thought, Deidara sit back on the back and read the instructions once more, even though he already did so twice.
Grabbing some of his clay – he sure didn't want to try to create art with a stupid rock, for Kami's sake – he started molding a creature with both his hands, hurriedly. In only one minute, he had a perfect looking snake, with the size of a garden one, coiled into itself as if sleeping. The scroll only said it would be instinctive, and that he should call his chakra as if he was going to create an explosion.
Concentrating on doing the already very well know procedure, he made sure not to actually explode the thing. With his eyes closed, he wondered about what he should do now – the energy would refuse to go back to his body now, it would demand to be released – when, to his astonishment, he felt his chakra slowly penetrating the small and warm sculpture. Holding still as not to disturb the process, he realized it was almost automatic, and all of the chakra he had concentrated at his palms left his hands until they were in the object.
It was weird, to say the least. He poked the creature, and could almost feel it. He didn't use much chakra – it would be insane to set a big explosion inside his room – and then he got up and carefully left the little snake inside one of his flak jackets, that was turned inside out. They were very resistant to damage, and would stand a small explosion.
Still aware of his chakra that was ready to detonate but, this time, was a few meters away from him, he ordered it to release, as he would if it were in his hands.
The small 'bang' made the jacket jump a little. He ran to it and turned it upside down, letting the white dust that was his small serpent fall to the floor and form a small cloud before settling.
He did it.
Now what was that about making things move, again?
Half an hour of re-reading later, and a small bird, more carefully crafted than the snake of before, rested on his palm. The scroll said that Aoki woman controlled a thirty centimeter tall puppet, and he shuddered when thinking about how she had put that thing inside the body. The easiest form of fitting the requirement was putting the object inside his mouth, and he did so, inserting the white bird inside his mouth and closing it. He called the explosive chakra to his mouth – and was ridiculously worried about doing so, since explosion release tended to, well, explode when called. Trying to ignore the mental image of what would happen to his face if such a thing happened, he willed the chakra to penetrate the clay, but felt it only washing over it. Not wanting to take the figurine out and try again, he used his tongue to carefully contour the bird's structure, feeling the chakra was now being infused better. Feeling he was done, he spitted his creation into his hand, and stared at it.
The bird didn't take well to the rough treatment of Deidara's tongue. Most of the details that made it look more real had partially melted, one wing was glued to the body, a tiny foot was deformed and there was only a stub left… it looked like something a child – an untalented one – would make while playing.
And then it moved.
Deidara didn't know if it was of its own accord or because its creator wanted it to, but it moved in his hand. That startled the blond, even though he knew he should have expected it – it was his objective, after all.
Still, it was shocking to see it actually happen. It was nothing pretty – the creature was deformed, after all, and would limp in its imperfect feet, and try to fly with only one working wing and end up falling to a side and struggling, like the deformed baby of some animal.
Still, at Deidara's eyes, it was the most fascinating of his creations, until now.
It didn't move the way the blond wanted it to because it was not physically capable of, so Deidara mentally ordered it to stay still, as one would order their chakra to work in a certain way to perform a jutsu.
After a little more observing, he put it on the floor a few meters away from him. He willed it to explode, but nothing happened. Remembering the book recommended the use of a seal to better command the thing. Knowing that, for the release of an already built technique, a seal was just the key that would give it strength, he decided he wanted to do it his own way, instead of using seals he used for other jutsu. Forming the confrontation one, he murmured the word those monks would scream at him when he would lose his concentration in one of his useless psychological appointments.
"Katsu!" and it sounded like an exclamation, while still in a low voice.
And the bird exploded.
Hard.
The onslaught of heat and power was much bigger than he expected, and the bird being only a few meters away from him, the explosion's force pushed him sprawled to the ground, and left a sizable hole on the floor.
A woman screamed from the apartment below his, and he could hear her crying and running away from her house. The only thing he could think about, however, was about how lucky he was he decided to use a small part of his chakra, or he would be seriously hurt, or make the already weak building fall down.
The various possibilities running wild in his mind, he went back to work with a smile so wide it hurt his cheeks.
It was already midday, and Deidara saw himself forced back to reality. He had skipped one day and a half of work and while he thought what he was doing was much more productive than border patrolling, the last thing he wanted was for someone to come knocking on his door.
Not to mention, what had happened about his break into the underground library? Surely it must have caused quite a commotion, and investigations must have started in the place.
Reality was harsh, but if he was to at least try to stay unsuspected, he had to report to the Tsuchikage with an excuse.
It was incredibly hard to get out of his apartment and on the streets. To his paranoid mind, it was as if every person at the street who looked at him was doing so because they suspected him of the crime. It didn't help that he was followed by the stares of the civilians he shared the apartment with. They were obviously resentful of his explosion and while he had always been a noisy neighbor, they never saw him creating a hole through the cement. Still, each of them lowered their eyes when he stared back.
Civilian and ninja looked troubled and anxious and only talked about this new breakup that was a painful reminder of the mysterious spy that had been walking freely around the Rock Village.
Forcing himself to focus as soon as he got closer to the office, for looking scared would be a dead giveaway, he passed in front of the door that led to the underground library – changed because his earth release had crushed the previous one, and now two jonin guards stood watch in front of it – and sent the whole scenery a surprised look, as if he weren't the one responsible for it. Telling himself over and over that if they even suspected it could have been him, he would already be under painful questioning or at the very least restrained, he went to the door to the Kage's enormous room and knocked twice.
"Enter".
He doesn't know. He doesn't know.
With a slightly troubled expression – he didn't present himself to work for one whole day and a half, after all, and that would explain it – Deidara opened the door and got down on one knee, bowing his head in a display of obedience. It helped that he didn't have to look his leader, whom he betrayed, in the eye while in this position.
"Speak."
"I have been absent from my duties in the past two days", he started.
"So I heard." The voice was impatient and cynical, but that was normal.
"My chakra… has been getting harder to control", he relayed the story he decided to tell. At first, he wanted something more carefully elaborated, but an excuse that was too perfect and sounded like a creation from his mind could end it all. "My research in the library had no results besides teaching me an useful technique or two." Oh, if he only knew. "I wanted to go to the Explosion Corps and see if there was a way to release some of my chakra, but I lost control of it last night and ended blasting a hole in my apartment."
Silence. And then, "Someday I will have to take those poor civilians away from you, as a charity. I can only imagine what they have to go through with such a troublesome neighbor. Look at me!"
Deidara looked up and finally took the man's appearance in. He was stressed and red on the face, his eyes even harder than usual, but that was to be expected. Such a breach in security would cause a scandal among civilian and shinobi, and lower the Rock Village's reputation as soon as the story became known to the rest of the world.
And he was the one who caused it. He didn't regret it, no – but it would be nice if his treachery didn't have such consequences.
"You do understand I cannot simply let you back down there. Did you hear about what happened?"
"Someone broke in to get something, huh. But that's all I can know for sure. The rumors have the most varied versions and some are ridiculous." So, his paranoid state that made him listen to almost every little word people in the village were saying about the village was useful, after all. "But I wouldn't get anything by going back there, sir. I already researched all I could, and found nothing but a couple of jutsu."
There was a long silence, and Deidara kept looking directly at his teacher's eyes. This was very unnerving. The man was usually straight to the point and then, get-out-of-my-office.
"Are you sure there was nothing?" Oonoki said, breaking the oppressive silence. "Didn't you learn any new… special technique? None at all?"
His voice was unusually calm, as the voice of a father or a patient teacher who was trying to talk to a small child.
"There were some, yeah. Like the Explosive Palm. I like that one, I never saw my bloodline limit as a means for defense. And some healing stuff too, but I already know these." Please, please, please, buy it.
"That's good to know. It's not like anyone without your bloodline limit would find anything useful in that section. And if I can't trust my own apprentice with access to the village's techniques, then who can I trust?"
The blond felt himself freeze in the inside. Was that a game? Would the Tsuchikage drop it now and call the guards? His face, by some miracle, still held the same attentive and bored expression, as he usually would when someone started mentioning trust and friends and anything of the like.
"Hmm. Yeah, that's right."
The Tsuchikage sent him a knowing smile, a very small one but it looked scandalous on the usually frowning, severe face. "Go search for Kurotsuchi, Deidara, and the two of you come back here. I will call Akatsuchi; he will be the third member of your group and will know what to do."
Deidara almost answered with a 'yeah'. Almost. "What about Issamu, huh?" shit, he almost forgot to ask about him.
"The boy has a special assignment and you probably won't be seeing him for a while. Now, out with you. I've got work to do."
"Yes, Tsuchikage-sama."
And it took a lot of self-control to get out of the office in a moderate pace, instead of just jumping out through some window, like he wanted to. Did the man know? Did anyone? He was sure the Tsuchikage had set numerous traps in which he could fall by saying the wrong words, as soon as he entered that office.
Oonoki let the friendly expression fall, and looked at the closed door with furrowed brows.
Deidara was more than he expected. The boy had held his composure quite well, and even acted the way he would in an ordinary day.
His apprentice also did quite well on stealing that scroll.
Of course, the boy had needed some help. Had the guards been the same as usual, Deidara wouldn't have stood a chance. It was quite imprudent of the boy, to break in like that, just with the help of his also chunin friend – former friend, actually – especially since he thought the scroll would be guarded by jonin-level shinobi.
But he would cure that thoughtlessness and make an useful asset for the village out of the rash blonde whose abilities would have to be growing considerably since yesterday.
The boy should be very grateful. Anyone else would have faced the death penalty by now.